Car­di­nals beat DBacks, boast 10-year record

St. Louis’ John Lackey pitched seven strong in­nings to guide the Car­di­nals to a 3-1 win at Ari­zona on Wed­nes­day, giv­ing the team its best win-loss record in a decade and main­tain­ing the handy lead atop the Na­tional League Cen­tral di­vi­sion.

The Car­di­nals re­mained 4-1/2 games clear of Pittsburgh, while the third-placed Chicago Cubs lost ground af­ter their win­ning streak ended at San Fran­cisco.

Hous­ton won at the New York Yan­kees to notch their 71st vic­tory of the sea­son, al­ready sur­pass­ing their to­tal in 2014, while Kansas City was beaten at home by a bighit­ting Bal­ti­more.

St. Louis’ Lackey (11-8) bounced back from a shaky start, giv­ing up a homer in the first in­ning but lit­tle else.

The Car­di­nals moved 36 games over an even win- loss record (81-45); their best mark since fin­ish­ing the 2005 sea­son plus-38. The Car­di­nals have also won 12 of their past 13 against Ari­zona.

San Fran­cisco’s Bran­don Belt hit a lead­off triple in the sixth in­ning and Buster Posey fol­lowed with a go-ahead dou­ble to lead the Giants to a 4-2 win against the Chicago Cubs.

It was their first win in six meet­ings this month against the Cubs.

Giants starter Jake Peavy (4-6) al­lowed two runs in 6-1/3 in­nings to frus­trate a Cubs lineup that had won its pre­vi­ous six games.

Hous­ton’s Evan Gat­tis hit two home runs to lift the Astros to a 6-2 win at the New York Yan­kees.

The AL West lead­ers’ 71 wins rep­re­sents their best sea­son in five years, and there are still 34 games to be played in the reg­u­lar sea­son.

Hous­ton starter Collin McHugh (14-7) kept up a re­cent run of ace pitch­ing, both for him­self and the team with the top ERA in the league. Hous­ton has won seven of nine, not per­mit­ting more than two runs in any game.

The de­feat dropped the Yan­kees two games be­hind Toronto, which leads the AL East di­vi­sion.

Bal­ti­more hit five home runs in an 8-5 win at Kansas City.

Chris Davis, Manny Machado and Jonathan Schoop each hit a tworun homer off Johnny Cueto (9-9), who la­bored through five in­nings. It was sec­ond straight shoddy start af­ter con­ced­ing 13 hits in a loss at Bos­ton.

The Ori­oles ended a six-game los­ing skid and sit two games off the sec­ond wild-card berth.

Toronto’s Ed­win En­car­na­cion hit a grand slam to ex­tend his hit­ting streak to 21 games and power the Blue Jays to a 12-4 win at Texas.

En­car­na­cion sent his 26th homer of the sea­son in a six-run sixth in­ning which prompted the Rangers to re­move start­ing pitcher Colby Lewis (14-6). Lewis is­sued four of a sea­son-worst 11 walks by Rangers pitch­ers.

Blue Jays starter David Price (13-4) cel­e­brated his 30th birth­day with a strong six in­nings af­ter hav­ing given up a two-run homer in the first, and guided Toronto to a fifth straight win.

Pittsburgh’s An­drew McCutchen home­red and drove in four runs to help the Pi­rates to a 7-2 vic­tory over Mi­ami.

McCutchen hit an RBI dou­ble in the first in­ning and helped spark a six-run sec­ond with a three-run home run. He is 6 for 13 with three dou­bles, a home run, and six RBIs over the first three games of the se­ries.

Min­nesota ex­tended its win­ning streak to six games with a 5-3 vic­tory at Tampa Bay.

Ed­uardo Es­co­bar hit solo homers in the sixth and eighth in­nings, with the sec­ond one be­ing the fi­nal score of the game.

Joe Mauer had a tiebreak­ing RBI sin­gle with bases loaded in the sev­enth.

San Diego’s Justin Up­ton home­red twice and had three RBIs as the Padres hung on to win 6-5 at Washington.

Matt Kemp added a two-run dou­ble for the Padres, who evened the three-game se­ries and will try for their fifth straight se­ries vic­tory in Thurs­day’s fi­nale.

Detroit’s Justin Ver­lan­der kept the Los An­ge­les An­gels hit­less un­til the ninth in­ning, and steered the Tigers to a 5-0 home win.